IMPRESSIONS
IMPRESSIONS
Dr. Stephen T. Radack III Editor
To Meet( PDM) or Not To Meet( PDM)…
Yes it’ s time to start thinking about the 2017 Pennsylvania’ s Dental Meeting, the 149th annual gathering of our PDA. As dentists, especially general dentists, we tend to think in six month blocks of time, at least I do. Maybe it is because we deal every day with the six-month recall. Sometimes I can’ t believe how fast the time passes when I see a patient in the office and it has been six months already. As you will see in this issue, the dedicated members of the Annual Meeting Planning Committee and our staff have put together another great program with a mix of continuing education and social events, as well as time for the business of your association and PDAIS. It is hard to believe that this will be the third year that the new meeting format will be held. As most will recall, our“ annual session” was an all governance meeting that was held each year to allow the former House of Delegates to convene.
The first non-governance meeting was held in 2015 at the conclusion of my year as your PDA president. Everyone involved in the planning of that meeting wasn’ t sure who, if anyone, would come. After all this was the first time that at least 87 members would not have to come to Hershey in April to meet. Well we had 237 people( 140 member dentists) attend that meeting. That may not seem like a lot, but it was the start of something new and exciting for PDA. Last year in Hershey, the attendance rocketed to over 600 people( 601 to be exact), including 278
member dentists. Can that number be topped at PDM 2017 next April? It will be up to you, the members, to make that happen.
The results of the most recent membership survey showed that members placed a low priority on PDA’ s annual meeting as a membership benefit. The survey also showed that members would prefer to get their CE local and not have to travel to a central location for it. This brings up the question of the future of Pennsylvania’ s Dental Meeting. Right now it is scheduled to continue until PDA’ s 150th anniversary celebration in April 2018, but after that the current Board of Trustees has voted to sunset the meeting. Instead, the annual meeting steering committee is considering several options, including partnering with the two regional meetings, Greater Philadelphia Valley Forge Dental Conference( held each spring) and the Three Rivers Dental Conference( held each fall); and working with district societies to consider rotating the meeting to those components who are interested in hosting the PDM. Those decisions have yet to be made, but the board certainly welcomes your input through your trustee, or through the leadership of the Council of Presidents.
I know that as a member of the Council on ADA Sessions we have also seen statistics that attendance at America’ s Dental Meeting is exhibiting its fair share of peaks and valleys, and while some of that may be dependent on the city in which the meeting is held, is it also a telling sign that may parallel PDA’ s member survey? As long as the ADA House of Delegates is in existence there will still be an annual meeting in some form. The unique things I have always enjoyed about the ADA is the opportunity to go to a different city every year. Yes they do have a rotation that has been pretty standard in the past, but this year the meeting was in Denver, which was a great city for a meeting and
very visitor friendly. Next year the meeting will be in Atlanta, another new city for the ADA.
Attending an annual meeting, whether as a member attending the vast array of CE or as a member of the HOD is a completely different experience. I can certainly attest to that having attended my first ADA meeting in Miami in 1986. Fun, CE, the biggest exhibit floor I could ever imagine and more fun. In 1994 I attended the annual meeting in New Orleans as an alternate delegate and realized it was a little different because of the time commitment to being part of the HOD: pre-caucus on Thursday, opening session of the HOD on Friday, reference committees on Saturday, district caucus on Sunday, HOD sessions on Monday and Tuesday. My staff and friends back home would always be envious of these“ vacations” that came around every fall: New Orleans( 3), Las Vegas( 2), San Francisco( 4), San Antonio( 2), Kansas City, Washington DC( 2), Philadelphia, and of course Honolulu( 3). They did not have any sympathy for me when I told them I did not have even a day to enjoy one of those cities without some type of commitment!
I could say the same thing for the former PDA Annual Sessions. Every April migrating to either Hershey, the Philadelphia area or Pittsburgh( back in the rotating days) and then Hershey for the last several years. That meeting used to start on Thursday evening with an opening session, reference committee hearings on Friday, the district caucuses on Saturday and the HOD sessions on Sunday until the business of the house was concluded. These governance annual sessions were a mini version of the ADA HOD meeting and provided little leisure time.
Having PDA Annual Session morph into the CE, social based Pennsylvania’ s Dental Meeting was and still is one of
NOV / DEC 2016 | PENNSYLVANIA DENTAL JOURNAL 5